It was a year after the war had started, and I was given leave. We rented a car and were driving up north. When I made up the plan the night before, she was already asleep. I loved the way she looked when she slept. Her soft, blonde hair spread out wide, and her beautiful green eyes shut gently. She had drifted off, and it was already three in the morning. I thought it would be a good idea to get some sleep as well and went to bed. She welcomed me and with her eyes closed and seemingly still asleep, she scooched back and gave me room. She was wearing a white nightgown and gave me her healing warmth. I put my arms around her, and we were very close and this is how we slept.
She’d always wake up before me. I liked that about her. She’d tell me if I wouldn’t be there, she’d be up at five. She liked the quietness in the morning. But she only liked it if no one else was up except for her. She wanted to be the first one. I think I understood, but I couldn't do it and I’d drag her back into bed and cuddle her for a couple more hours while sleeping to get her warm energy for the day. Usually she’d submit, but that morning I woke up and she was gone. I vaguely remembered hearing her get up a few hours ago as I was in between the dream world and this world, but I didn’t like not having her there as I woke up, so I went back to sleep.It must have been another two hours at least, and then I was not able to open my eyes anymore. She came into the bedroom, and I smelled the coffee. And even in my state, I could hear from the slow steps she took that she was holding coffee in her hand. She might have said something, but I was too sleepy. I just remember her putting down the coffee on the nightstand. “I brought you coffee.”, she said. “So you can get up now!”
I felt her smile, but my eyes wouldn’t open, and I turned in the bed and the cover felt warm. There she jumped on the bed and her soft hands were on my chest and she tried to move me. Still, my eyes didn’t open. “Time to get up!”, she said. I felt my hand going up and finding her hair hanging down. I grabbed it. My eyes opened, but the blur stayed. I gently pulled on her hair and I enjoyed what it felt like. The vision started to clear. Her smile was all I needed. And when I saw it I was happy I woke up. I pulled on that hair again and pulled her down to me and gave her a kiss. “Are you getting up or staying in bed?”, she asked. “Well, that depends.”, I smirked at her. “You’re getting up!”, she smiled and kissed me again. “We have a trip to do.”, she handed me the mug and as I was able to see again, I realized it was my favorite mug. With the rough stone on the outside. The coffee tasted great and she sat beside me in bed. I was still too tired to talk and just listened to her tell me her plans for the trip. It made me happy listening to her talk with that smile on her face. I realized it would be a good day.
The guy at the car rental was friendly. The car was fine. We had a long trip ahead and it felt good being in the car with her. It had been rainy for about as long as I cared to remember, but that morning the sky was clear and the sun was strong. I enjoyed driving on those days. In my mind, that was how long drives should go. Start off with beautiful weather on the way there, then end with blistering rain on the way back. Both provide nice driving experiences. We had picked up the car at the airport and we stayed on the highway for a while. It went straight for about an hour and for the first half we would see the planes passing in the other direction on their approach to land. I asked her some things I didn’t know about her and she told me and I twisted them and we laughed. It was a fine time with her in the car and we listened to music and there was lots to talk about. We talked until we got off the highway and started going west towards Wales. I was happy to get some corners on the road. I didn’t like just going straight. That wasn’t driving in my mind anyway.
As it turned noon, I got hungry. I asked her if she was hungry and she said: “Not really.”, that meant she would eat. We were going down a country road and there were not many options and most food stops had closed for Sunday. Finally, we entered a small town and I stopped at the pub. It was practically empty - just a middle aged woman behind the bar and a young girl serving tables. The girl looked like she had never left that little town. She was pretty, but not gorgeous, but she had something unique about her face. Her hair was dark blonde. She was not as beautiful as Julia but smiled at her as we came in. “Are you open?”, I asked politely and the middle-aged woman lost that angry stare and brightened up from behind that wrinkled face. She looked like she smoked a lot. But I could tell she was a good person. “Sure, are!”, she said. I told Julia to go find a table outside and I asked what they had. She told me if I waited another twenty minutes, she could give me Sunday roast. But I didn’t want to waste time and was anxious to get back on the road and get to the hotel. I saw some croissants, but it wouldn’t be enough. I asked her if she got something hot to eat right away and she offered me some onion cake and I accepted. I wanted to get a pint as well but settled for coffee for the sake of better driving. I brought out two warm onion cakes and espresso for both of us and Julia was sitting outside facing the sun with her eyes closed and sunken in her dream world. She smiled at me when I came back. We ate, and the onion cake was delicious, even though it was gone in a few bites. I tried to match it with the espresso.
“Where did you go today?”
“When?”, she asked.
“In the morning.”, I wondered. “Why weren’t you in bed?”“I couldn’t stay today. I went outside. I walked for about an hour.”“You walked?”, I asked. “Yes.”, she said. “Why didn’t you stay in bed with me? It would have been nicer than walking, I said.” She smiled and elegantly drank her espresso. “Maybe it would. But it was so beautiful in the morning. It was so quiet. There was nobody.” “So what did you do?”, I asked, and I saw her eyes drift in imagination again. “I walked for a while. Then I sat down at this bench and I journaled a bit, and then there was this old man walking by. And I saw him from far away, and he walked really slowly. But it didn’t seem to bother him at all. He was just walking, and when he passed, he smiled at me.”
“He smiled at you?”, I asked. “Yes, but he was really old. Like grandpa old. But he had this wonderful smile. He was really happy. And it made me feel good.”
It felt good listening to her. I could listen to her talk all day. Every time I realized she saw the world from such a vastly different point than me. It was probably a better way to see the world. A more innocent one. But if I’d see it that way, I wouldn’t survive. I was happy that she could do it. And that I could listen. We finished and I had already paid inside and it was 7 pounds for two onion cakes and two espressos, and compared to London, I thought it was very cheap and I liked this little town with the nice sun, peeking from behind a small stone church and I had forgotten about the war for a moment. Then we got back in the car, and we were driving again.
I realized we had to be very close to Wales and I wondered how many armies throughout history had attempted to cross before. I asked Julia what she knew about World War 2 and it wasn’t much. And I told her some things and she acted like she cared, but I told her it was important to know, and she acted like she took it seriously and then we laughed and I drove faster and turned up the music and turned the corner and BANG! Julia didn’t seem like she noticed, but I did and I felt it driving. And I wasn’t sure what it was and I was praying for it to be something else and I kept driving up the country road. Up a hill and the car was vibrating on the floor and finally I slowed, I blinked and I stopped on the side. “What’s going on?”, she asked. And I told her that it was all good and to stay in the car. I went outside and I realized. The front tire was banged up good. Completely ripped apart and flat for good. And there was nothing around me but green fields and black-white cows.
Julia came out and she saw the tire and she laughed and asked: “What now?”, and I told her to get comfortable and she started wondering about and taking pictures. Where we stood was a forest and on the other side was a green field, with a single farmhouse and a big British flag gliding in the air. It was a bit of a canyon and the forest went straight up the hill beside us. It was really lovely and the air felt cool from the woods. During the last ten minutes driving here, not a single car had passed. Remote described our location quite well.
I popped the trunk and there was no extra tire and just as I dialed to call the rental company, somebody asked me what was going on. It was a young guy, maybe mid-twenties. He seemed a bit skinny, but I could tell he was strong. I realized I stood at his entrance and told him I’d be gone in a moment, but he saw the broken tire and brightened up and told me he was a mechanic.
“Come with me.”, he told me and I told Julia to wait in the car and I went with him and he let me into his garden and his parents and his adult sister were sitting there and playing cards and they looked like the calmest people I have ever seen. His parents were sitting together on a big rocking chair and his sister and him had chairs on the other side of the garden table and they had coffee and snacks and two dogs sitting under the table. It was perfect. The war did not exist here. The son leaned over to them and whispered something and then he turned back to me and said: “I don’t have the exact tire you need, but I can get my truck and tow you there.”
He told me he had to get his truck from their second farm and it would be about fifteen minutes and I thanked him as he left and went back to the car and told Julia. Then I used the time to make out with her and twenty minutes later the guy showed up with his truck and it wasn’t just a truck; it was a damn car transporter. His dad and him pulled our car on the transporter and I helped them. I turned to Julia and said: “In the middle of fuck nowhere in Wales, and the tire brakes in front of the doors of the one mechanic around. How lucky are we?”Julia looked at me and smiled: “We are very lucky.”, and I kissed her.
I was riding up front with the guy and his name was Ryan. Julia sat in the back and was taken by the landscape. Just behind their farm, it started to become truly magical. Lush green fields with happy sheep and cows and wild forests and far-reaching hills and it was God's country that we had entered. Ryan was a good man. He told us how he had never left his town; he had never flown with a plane, and he didn’t really want to. He was a mechanic and that was all he was and he loved that. He seemed simple, but smart. And he was happy. And it was a different life on those hills and I felt good being there now.
When we got to the hotel, we had entered a different world. Everything was green and there was a giant lake surrounded by forest. On a little hill beside it stood the hotel, which was the only man-made structure around, overlooking the lake. I asked Ryan to let me buy him a beer before checking in and we went on the balcony of the hotel restaurant, overlooking the vast lake and watched the sun sink down towards the horizon. It had become cool, but it was not cold yet and we drank Guinness. Julia seemed happy and she watched me and Ryan talk and sometimes made a joke. “Do you know the history of this place?”, he asked us and we shook our heads. “You know this isn’t actually a natural lake?”
“It’s not? It looks very natural.”, Julia said.
“Before this was a lake, it used to be a village.”
“A village?”, I asked. “So was there a storm?”.
“No.”, Ryan said. “They flooded it. And they didn’t even ask the people living here about it. They just told them two days before, and then they flooded it.”“This is horrible.”, Julia said as I stared over the lake and drank my Guinness.
“Why did they flood it then?”, I wondered. “For the water supply of Manchester. It came from here. And some of it still does.”
“Do you think everybody made it out before they flooded it?”, I asked.
“The story says some folk stayed behind. As protest. But there is no way they made it. Four years ago, there was a really hot summer and the lake went back and we could see some old structures from the town still there.” I looked at Julia and we both felt how wrong that was. We finished our beers and Ryan went home.
It felt good finally being alone with Julia in the hotel and we checked in and went up to our room and it was a stunner. Big room with an extravagant bathroom and big windows overlooking the lake, which was swallowing the orange hue of the setting sun on its endless small waves, spanning all across the water.
I stood at the window and watched the water, as I have always done together with my father when I was a child. Julia joined me and I couldn’t tell what was more beautiful, the view of the lake or her beside me. When she turned to me, the orange light of the setting sun, brushed over her hair and gently glinted through, throwing shadows on my face. She looked at me and smiled and her eyes held all the hope and love I cared to see and I knew the answer and I kissed her. Then I kissed her more and felt her perfect ass, and she melted away and I made love to her during sunset.
We showered together and I left the shower first and lay in bed and looked outside and it felt so calm and nice and right. When she came out, I watched her get dressed and I liked how elegantly and femininely she moved around the room. “Don’t you want to get ready?”, she asked.“Oh I will, but I’ll better give you a head start or I’ll wait in my nice shirt for an hour. “It won’t take that long!”, she said and I said:” Yeah. Yeah.”, and kept watching her for another hour.
Life offers some simple pleasures that a gentleman appreciates as the essence of enjoyment. One of those simple pleasures is making love to a beautiful woman, then dressing up nicely and taking her out for dinner in a fine hotel. And that is what we did.
The waitress was kind and I ordered: confit duck terrine and goat cheese & roasted fig tart as starters, with 8-hour braised lamb and mini shepherd pie, as well as the mushroom ragu and the duck breast for mains. She asked us what we wanted to drink, and we had malbec, and it felt just right on my tongue. It was good wine and filled your mouth with the right kind of warmth. We had a fine time and Julia looked at me and said: “I have never felt like I feel with you.” And as that young girl sat there leaned forward with her eyes open and her beautiful hand folded on top of each other on the table, I put my hand over hers. There I felt a strong and deep sadness and as it pierced, I looked down at her hands and let the pain glide into a sort of sweet pleasure. As she looked at me, I felt her starting to worry, so I looked up at her and into her eyes and I smiled. I knew this was the last weekend we would have together.
We spent a nice night and made love two more times and then we slept close together and she looked like an angel when she slept on her stomach with her hair golden around her face. I felt like I could hear the lake down there in the valley over the lost village and I wondered why I couldn’t just stay right there right then and hold her in my arms until the next morning and the next day and every day after that and look at her eyes and watch her smile and wake up with coffee in bed. And I wondered if the war would ever end and I tried to not think about the front, but every time I closed my eyes, I remembered more of what I had seen and couldn’t ignore the fact that after that weekend ended, they would ship me back to war. I had no idea how I survived the insane horrors of the front before, but I knew I wouldn’t do so again.
I turned back and watched Julia sleep and there was nothing I could do to stop the time from ticking away. Finally, I gave up on sleeping and decided that it was enough if she was at peace.
I still think I am one of the lucky ones.
At least I got to love.
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